Three-day National Conference Convoked in Atlantic City to Plan 1949 U.J.A. Drive

A three-day national conference to plan the 1949 campaign for the United Jewish Appeal will open in Atlantic City on Jan. 12, it was announced here today.

The national conference will also observe the tenth anniversary of the establishment of the United Jewish Appeal as the combined campaign through which American Jews have achieved a decade of dedicated service in the tasks of saving and rebuilding the lives of the surviving victims of persecution and war in Europe.

The Atlantic City meeting will set up a unified fund-raising program for 1949 for the United Palestine Appeal, the Joint Distribution Committee and the United Service for New Americans, according to the joint statement that was issued by William Rosenwald, Hermen L. Weisman and Rabbi Jonah B. Wise, national chairmen of the U.J.A. The statement listed the following principal subjects for consideration at the conference:

1. The emptying of the Jewish DP camps in Europe. With most of the Jewish DP’s in Italy already transferred to Israel, and the Jewish DP population in Austria greatly reduced, the major emphasis will be on the American-occupied zone of Germany, where nearly 100,000 displaced Jews still remain.

2. The immigration to and absorption in Israel in 1949 of more than 150,000 Jews from the DP centers and other parts of Europe and North Africa.

3. The situation of more than 1,000,000 Jews in North Africa and Moslem countries. Suffering from both economic and social hardships, which have been intensified as a result of recent developments, the position of these Jews is increasingly difficult.

4. Plans by the J.D.C. for expanding its reconstruction program in both Eastern and Western Europe, widening its network of health and medical installations and increasing its efforts in the field of child care.

5. The program of aid to refugees reaching the United States. With Congress expected to act shortly on President Truman’s proposal to liberalize the present DP Law, which has the effect of restricting immigration of Jews to the U.S., the United Service for New Americans is preparing to care for larger numbers of arrivals in 1949.

The U.J.A. conference will also discuss a huge housing program in Israel by the U.P.A. to shelter the newcomers in 1949 and the many thousands of 1948 arrivals who are still without permanent dwellings. Other UJA-supported projects in Israel in connection with the absorption of immigrants will include reconstruction of war-devastated settlements, establishment of new settlements and expansion of present agricultural establishments. Another key project involves large-scale development of the Negev.